House of Cards

We live in a big house. It's a pretty house. It has nice wood and tile floors, marble countertops (in some places), expensive fixtures and appliances, and a whole lot of shiny wood closets and doors and doorframes and whatnot. It has three storeys, or six depending on what you count as a storey, and four bedrooms, and four bathrooms, and a jacuzzi tub. It has huge picture windows overlooking the terraced fields out back, and a terraced backyard, and all manner of beautiful and luxurious features. Some of you have seen it in person, and others have seen it in photos. If you haven't seen it in photos, click here.

But the thing about this particular house is that it appears to have been built with such a preoccupation with form that function has fallen by the wayside. For instance:

-The electric hot water tank is on the roof, where it is exposed to the cold night winds and various elements, and where should it leak, as it has done, it causes indoor rain. Hot indoor rain.

-The whole main stairwell of the house, which is the central feature around which the house, um, centres, is covered by a big skylight made of alternating stripes of yellow and white glass. It looks a bit like a glass awning. It also, in the event of torrential rain, leaks impressively. Only in the two months when there is rain, admittedly, but when it does rain it really rains.

-No door or window fits very well into its frame. This results in the entrance of water, wind and dust, whatever happens to be going on weatherwise, and during a robust downpour last March, a puddle formed on the rooftop patio, and then seeped under the patio door, causing a waterfall down the big staircase. Also, doors and windows rattle ominously at the slightest breeze/passing vehicle/earthquake. Sometimes it seems that people are simultaneously trying to break in through every door and window.

-The shaft. The master bathroom is lit by a skylight, which is about four feet higher than the ceiling, through a concrete shaft. The skylight itself is not completely closed in; the glass of the skylight sits several inches above one side of its presumed frame. No rain has gotten in, when there was rain, but the shaft channels metallic grit and volcanic dust down into the bathroom in remarkable quantities, so that toiletries and toothbrushes are constantly being coated in grey grit. Twice, now, I've found pigeon feathers in the sink, although I doubt a whole pigeon could get in. Given the absence of a bathroom fan or any sort of ventilation in the concrete walls, the shaft allows humidity from the shower to escape. It's just that it lets a whole lot of other stuff in, too.

-The plumbing is ridiculous. The home has an electric hot water tank, as critiqued above, and also solar water heating. The electric heater runs from 3-5 am and again from 5-7 pm, on a timer. Sometime around 7-9 am, depending on how many baths and showers are happening, the tank runs out of electrically heated water and starts drawing solar heated water instead. For some reason, around this time, the water pressure gets low and we get air in the lines. The result is spitting, popping hot water for anywhere from ten minutes to a half hour. Then, around 5 pm, presumably due to some related factor, if the hot water hasn't been turned on for a while, when it is turned on the pressure is too strong and causes the tap to quiver and hot water to splatter at great velocity out of the sink with the force of the stream.

-The wiring is worrying. The other night when I turned off my bedroom light, I heard the *ping* *ping* of rapidly cooling, contracting metal, and smelled a burnt hair odour. Since then, every time the light is used, it makes odd noises that seem consistent with overheating. The walls are all concrete, and the other day we discovered that an unmarked plastic pipe sticking up out of the ground in the backyard actually leads into the wiring in the kitchen. We know this because Joffre decided to run the garden hose into this pipe, with the result that water poured out of the light switches, electrical outlets, and electric panel that are located in that wall.

-The trouble with wood. Clearly, the wood in the house is mostly for looks. Although there have been no problems with wooden closets and cabinet doors, the wood floorboards have shrunken with the dryness, causing several great, sharp-edged gaps to appear between boards. The base boards are completely cosmetic, and are attached to the wall with glue. Then, three-quarter-round has been flimsily attached to the base boards with a few finishing nails. Base boards are coming off all over the house. Last week, Joffre walked by me brandishing a 10-foot length of three-quarter-round, bristling with finishing nails. When I relieved him of it, he screamed at me for taking his "sword." "Lance," more like.

-The dining room table was made from green wood, apparently, as its majestic girth is now marred by two long and vicious cracks that start at opposite ends of the table and terminate about a foot from the middle on either side. If and when the cracks connect, I fear that a third of the table will fall right off. Also, the chairs around the table are upholstered with leather, which does not handle the rigors of dining table activity well (spills, stains, scuffs, etc), in spite of our attempts to be careful. I will probably need to clean them all with saddle soap before we leave.

-The handles have repeatedly fallen off many drawers and closet doors, because the screws are too short.

-No, really, the plumbing is ridiculous!! We have had pipes replaced, more than once, in both the downstairs bathroom and the kids' bathroom, due to repeated leaks and backup issues. We recently had to have the drain on the kitchen sink repaired due to leaks. In spite of all this effort, the spaces under every single sink in the house are dank, moldy, and wet, to the point in some cases of seriously warping and ruining the melamine cupboard walls. Remember that we live in a desert. When I've pointed this out to the company handymen, they claim that I use too much hot water/water that is too hot, and that this causes the pipes to contract and expand too much, creating leaks.

I'm sure I could think of more issues, but you get the point.